Relaunch Day Two. After his U-turn over the 10p tax rate, Gordon Brown has set out his programme for the next parliamentary session, which will be the last full one before a general election, now expected in 2010.

It was a heavy mixture of populist and Blairite reforming measures designed to show the country, and more important his party, that Mr Brown has not run out of steam and that he has spirit for the fight ahead.

In the Prime Minister's Question Time that preceded his statement, it was a more attacking Mr Brown, swapping punch for punch with David Cameron. Friends have told him to show Mr Cameron less respect. He does not have a high opinion of him; why not show it? So, given the battering he has received in recent days, Mr Brown more than held his own ... in House of Commons terms.

But no-one should be in any doubt. Mr Brown's Queen's Speech preview, just like the 10p mini-Budget yesterday, was rushed forward to shore up the Prime Minister who has been under the severest public and private onslaught. They are most definitely not measures suddenly produced to help Labour win the Crewe and Nantwich by-election. At most they might help Labour limit the damage there from what is likely to be a bad result. No, it is far more serious than that. Mr Brown desperately needed to get on to the front foot to see off the wave of speculation that has suddenly embroiled him. He could not do that without sorting the 10p problem - which in the eyes of Labour MPs he has done. But in dealing with that difficulty Mr Brown has done further damage to his reputation for caution and prudence in financial matters. So the criticism of him today has come from a different angle.

Mr Brown has today come forward with measures of which Tony Blair, whom we know he has been talking to, would have approved. A Savings Bill to help home and wealth ownership; more power for parents and patients; payments to NHS hospitals to be adjusted according to satisfaction of people treated in them; directly elected representatives to have powers over policing. Beat all of that for Blairism.

Mr Brown knows that to get through he has to get his head down and govern. Crewe will be a problem, but one he should get over provided the tax package prevents a rout. And then in June he faces the problem of the 42-day detention row. Most Labour MPs believe he should be given time. They will judge him again at conference time in the autumn, and again after next year's local elections. He faces a long, hard haul to get to the next election, let alone fight it.

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